Mesenchymal Stem Cells Inhibit Epithelial-to-Mesenchymal Transition by Modulating the IRE1α Branch of the Endoplasmic Reticulum Stress Response

Figure 5

Suppression of ER stress contributed to MSC-mediated amelioration of EMT in A549 cells. (a) A549 cells were treated with 100 μM TUDCA for different times. The protein expression levels of BiP, ATF6, ATF4, XBP-1s and XBP-1u were measured using western blotting and quantified using densitometry in ImageJ software (n = 3, one-way ANOVA with Duncan’s post hoc test). (b) A549 cells were treated with 10 ng/ml TGF-β1 in the presence or absence of TUDCA for 72 hr. The protein expression levels of BiP, ATF6, ATF4, XBP-1s and XBP-1u were measured using western blotting and quantified using densitometry in ImageJ software (n = 4, one-way ANOVA with Duncan’s post hoc test). (c) A549 cells were treated with 100 μM TUDCA for different times. The protein expression levels of E-cadherin and vimentin were measured using western blotting and quantified using densitometry in ImageJ software (n = 3, one-way ANOVA with Duncan’s post hoc test). (d) A549 cells were treated with 10 ng/ml TGF-β1 in the presence or absence of TUDCA for 72 hr. The protein expression levels of E-cadherin and vimentin were measured using western blotting and quantified using densitometry in ImageJ software (n = 4, one-way ANOVA with Duncan’s post hoc test). The data are shown as the means ± SEMs (, vs. the control group; ^##, ^# vs. the TGF-β1 group).

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